1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to electronic data systems on aircraft. More particularly, the invention concerns a digital interface device for conveying signals between aircraft data buses and a wingtip weapons station. This device is especially useful because it includes a processing module that couples to an existing input/output connector in substitution for an Aircraft Instrumentation Subsystem Internal (AISI) pod.
2. Description of the Related Art
One useful development in aircraft weapons and data systems has been the air combat training (ACT) pod. Originally, in aircraft such as the F-15, ACT pods were mounted at a weapon station outboard on the wing. The original model of external ACT pod received various data from aircraft systems and transmitted this data to ground stations in proximity of the aircraft. The ACT pod was connected to the aircraft systems by a specially designed assortment of individual wires or digital data buses passing from the aircraft's fuselage to the wingtip station.
Subsequently, engineers associated with the F/A-18 aircraft developed an "internal" ACT pod, contained in the aircraft's nose. Although the internal ACT pod provided more features than the original "external" ACT pod, the antenna coverage of the internal ACT pod is masked during certain flight regimes.
Engineers at Cubic Corporation have recently developed an improved ACT pod known as the air combat training rangeless (ACT-R) pod. The ACT-R pod provides improved performance features with respect to the previous internal and external ACT pods. Furthermore, since the ACT-R pod is designed for mounting at a wingtip station, it avoids antenna masking experienced in the nose-mounted internal ACT pod. However, since the F/A-18 aircraft was designed explicitly for use with a nose-mounted ACT pod, no provision was made for conveying the necessary signals to a wingtip mounted station. Therefore, due to certain unsolved problems, wingtip ACT pods such as the ACT-R pod are not completely adequate for certain uses such as the F/A-18 aircraft.